I spend the evening leafleting the estates again, as it’s the day before the election. The feeling in the committee room, where people are squatting on the floor addressing envelopes, is that it’ll be close. No one actually thinks we’ll put an end to Thatcherism this time, but at least Thatcher won’t have put an end to socialism.
I’d seen Kinnock at a Labour rally held in a sports hall in Leicester on Friday. There are at least 2,000 people there and it is strictly an all-ticket affair: they are very nervous of hecklers, as the meeting is being televised. There is a squad of large women bouncers who, when a heckler starts up, grab the dissident by the hair and shove her or him out of the hall at high speed. They are also nervous of anything too radicaclass="underline" I’ve been instructed not to use the word ‘comrade’ in my speech, though it is Kinnock’s first word.
The Labour organisation has wound up the crowd expertly and they are delirious, kicking out a tremendous din with their heels against the back of the wooden benches. When I introduce Kinnock, he and Glenys come through the hall surrounded by a brass band, pushing through photographers and fans like a couple of movie stars.
Kinnock speaks brilliantly, contrasting levity and passion, blasting off with a string of anti-Tory jokes. I know that various sympathetic writers and comedians have been sending lines and gags round to his house and he’s been working them into the speeches he always insists on writing himself. The impression is of someone who is half stand-up comic and half revivalist preacher. What is also clear is his humanity and goodness, his real concern for the many inequalities of our society. At the end of the meeting the crowd sings ‘We Shall Overcome’ and ‘The Red Flag’ and we cheer and cheer. For these two hours I can’t see how we can fail to win the election.
15 JUNE 1987
Everyone still reeling from the shock of the election defeat and from the knowledge that we were completely wrong about the extent of the Labour failure. We lost in Fulham by 6,000 votes, though we’d won the seat at a recent by-election. Someone tells me that the people on the estate I leafleted voted 3 to 1 for the Tories. What this Tory victory means is the death of the dream of the 1960s, which was that our society would become more adjusted to the needs of all the people who live in it; that it would become more compassionate, more liberal, more tolerant, less intent on excluding various groups from the domain of the human; that the Health Service, education, and the spectrum of social services would be more valued and that through them our society would become fairer, less unequal, less harshly competitive; and that the lives of the marginalised and excluded would not continue to be wasted. But for the third time running, the British people have shown that this is precisely what they don’t want.
We invite a bunch of friends to a showing of Sammy and Rosie, mainly to look at two significant changes: one is the putting back of the shooting of the black woman; the other the inclusion of Roland’s long speech about domestic colonialism.
Well, as we stand around in the preview theatre, some people argue that we don’t need the shooting as it’s too obvious. Others say you need its power and clarity. I can see that Frears has made up his mind in favour of it at last. I can also see that he is glad to have put back Roland’s speech as it anchors the first half of the film and gives Danny’s character more substance. The hardest scene to decide about is the very end, with Sammy and Rosie walking by the river. Frears says he hates unhappy endings, so he’d added it to lighten the tone. But someone else says it gives the movie two endings; and, worse than that, it’s an attempt to have it both ways — to cheer up what is a sad and rather despairing film.
Despite these bits and pieces, I feel it now has shape and thrust and pace, due to the incredible amount of work Frears and Mick Audsley have done in the editing.
Sarah also comes to this screening, and we leave together, walking down Charing Cross Road. She has said little so far and when I ask about the film this time around, her reaction is more ambiguous. She says: ‘Yes, this time it wasn’t so easy. Rosie seemed too hard and uncaring; surely I am not hard and uncaring? Perhaps I am like that and haven’t been able to see that side of myself? Perhaps that is your objective view of me. Oh, it’s difficult for me because I have had the sensation recently, when I’m at work or with a friend — it just comes over me — that I’m turning into the character you’ve written and Stephen has directed and the actress has portrayed. What have you done?’
19 JUNE 1987
Frears exceedingly cheerful and enjoying finishing the film, putting the frills on, playing around with it. He never stops working on it or worrying about it. He talks about using some of Thatcher’s speeches: over the beginning, he says, just after the credits, the St Francis speech would do nicely. And somewhere else. Where? I ask. You’ll have to wait and see, he replies.
Stanley Myers, who is in charge of the music, gives me a tape of music which has been put together by Charlie Gillett. It’s terrific stuff: bits of African rhythms, reggae, and some salsa and rap stuff.
8 JULY 1987
To see the almost finished Sammy and Rosie. It’s been dubbed now; the sound is good and the music is on. Frears has put back the scene between Anna and Sammy where she pushes him half out of her studio and interrogates him about his other girlfriends. I thought this scene had gone for good, but Frears continues to experiment. He’d said it would be a surprise where he’d use the Thatcher material. It is. It’s right at the front, before the credits, over a shot of the waste ground after the eviction. It works as a kind of prologue and hums with threat and anticipation, though with its mention of the ‘inner city’ it also seems to be presenting an issue film. But anger and despair following the election have gone straight into the film, giving it a hard political edge. Frears’s struggle over the last few weeks has been to reconcile those two difficult things: the love of Sammy and Rosie for each other, and the numerous issues that surround them. At last he’s given the story a clarity and definition I couldn’t find for it in the script.
I sit through the film in a kind of haze, unable to enjoy or understand it. I can see how complete it is now, but I have no idea of what it will mean for other people, what an audience seeing it freshly will make of it. Only then will the circle be complete. We’ll just have to wait and see.
After the screening someone says how surprised they are that such a film got made at all, that somehow the police didn’t come round to your house and say: This kind of thing isn’t allowed! Of course it won’t be when the new Obscenity Bill goes through.
Later that night I go out for a drink with a friend in Notting Hill. We go to a pub. It’s a dingy place, with a dwarf barmaid. It’s mostly black men there, playing pool. And some white girls, not talking much, looking tired and unhealthy. On the walls are warnings against the selling of drugs on the premises. Loud music, a DJ, a little dancing. A fight breaks out in the next bar. Immediately the pub is invaded by police. They drag the fighters outside and throw them into a van. People gather round. It’s a hot night. And soon the air is full of police sirens. Six police vans show up. The cops jump out and grab anyone standing nearby. They are very truculent and jumpy, though no one is especially aggressive towards them. We leave and drive along the All Saints Road, an area known for its drug dealers. Twice we’re stopped and questioned: Where are we going, why are we in the area, what are our names? Black people in cars are pulled out and searched. Eventually we park the car and walk around. The area is swamped with police. They’re in couples, stationed every twenty-five yards from each other. There’s barely anyone else in the street.